Anyone familiar with HARO bikes ?

[Meer123]

Apparently HARO's BMX stuff garnered them a lot of praise back in the day (i.e. - the early 80's ?) ... anyway ... I just won a 1997 Haro Vector V1 on Egay for $26 ($70 shipped, all inclusive) and it'll be delivered a few days. I chose it because (aside from the price) is has an old school chro-mo frame and fork that offers a good familiar "feel" and strength. I am writing because I do not have as much bicycle wisdom as I had earlier believed - I was under the impression that bikes were very modular and that forks were interchangeable (as are headsets and handlebars) but as I do my shopping and research, I'm seeing all sorts of different specs. So, are forks and headsets and handlebars and seat posts all different and not interchangeable or are the certain specs that are more common then others despite the apparent variety ? In real cars, I know that many FWD cars w/4 bolts have a 4x100 bolt pattern for example and most older 4 bolt rear wheel drive Toyotas and Datsuns have a 4x114.3 bolt pattern … there's exceptions for sure but these are right on for the most part. Is it ok for me to assume that 85% of mountain bike components are universal or is each model within each brand (and def between brand to brand) going to have unique headset measurements and different diameter handlebars … etc ? Depending on the answer to this inquiry - my second question is - is there a "Haro" enthusiast in the house willing to share knowledge of specs and measurements ?

If you are like some folks who practically live on these forums - I am sure you've seen my posts with all sorts of questions under the electric bike section and the 2 stroke section - thank you for accommodating my curiosity and thanks for being patient - I have many questions because I do love the hobby vs. me just asking to be a nuisance

 

[ocscully]

The answers to your questions are both Yes & No. It depends on which specific parts you are asking about? Handlebars are pretty much interchangable until just the last few years the standard h-bar clamp dia. is 25.4mm/1in. But now downhill/extreme/jumping MTB's are 31.8mm. Road Drop type H-bars used to be either 25.4mm or 26.0mm, but they come in 31.8mm now as well. Head sets used to be 1in. up until the early 90's and then 1&1/8in. and 1&1/4 became available. The 1&1/4 never caught on and the 1&1/8 became the new standard. In the early 90's another change with H-sets was the switch from threaded to threadless. By 97 I'm pretty sure your Haro will have a 1&1/8in. threadless H-set and fork steerer. The measurement that becomes critical when interchanging forks is the lengh of the steerer tube. Seatposts are not the same from one bike model to the next. They come in many different sizes. Seatpost size is dictated by the inside dia. of the seat-tube the builder/manufacturer used when building the frame. By 1997 most MTB's had some (63mm-80mm) suspension correction built into them. So if you don't want to affect the handling of your bike you need to keep the travel of any fork you add to it within this range.

ocscully

 

[Meer123]

ocscully - my friend, you know your bikes ! Thanks, some of that was very helpful and some of it - well - it just confirmed that I will need to do a bit more research before anything is purchased or ordered - not a bad thing and should keep impulse buying in check